Electronic games have become a popular form of entertainment. These games may be casino, wagering type games where a player deposits money in the form of coins, gaming tokens or paper currency either into a coin acceptor-tester or bill acceptor (“the coin-in”). The coins and gaming tokens are collected in a reservoir inside the gaming machine (“the hopper”) while the paper currency is collected in the bill acceptor inside the gaming machine. If the coins, gaming tokens or paper currency are validated as authentic, the player accrues the appropriate number of playing units (“credits”) on a credit meter on the gaming machine depending on the denomination of the wager as set on the gaming machine. For example, a twenty-five cent gaming machine will accrue four credits for each dollar deposited into the gaming machine by way of the coin head or the bill acceptor.
After accruing credits on the credit meter, the player determines how many credits he wishes to wager on the next spin of the slot reels (“total bet”) and then spins the reels by pressing the spin button or by pulling a handle. When prompted by pushing a spin button or pulling a handle, a controlling processor randomly selects and outcome and controls a display to display the outcome. The display may consist of electro-mechanical reels or a VRT or plasma display. In many modern machines, the outcome is in the form of a 3×3 or 3×5 matrix of game symbols. The processor compares the outcome to determine if one or more predetermined winning outcomes have been obtained. For each winning outcome, which may be predetermined symbol combinations along any enabled pay line for the machine or a set of predetermined scattered symbols, the processor issues an award to the player. After the award based upon the outcome of the spin has been issued based upon the display of symbols, the player inputs another wager and prompts a further spin.
In some slot machines, certain symbol combinations can trigger a bonus event, such as a bonus screen through which the player can win an additional award.
In another unrelated, prior art game referred to as “Bedazzled” (which can be downloaded or played online at popcap.com) and available for play as an amusement game on the Internet, there is a computer generated matrix of game symbols, each randomly assigned into a coordinate of the matrix defined by horizontal rows and vertical columns. To play the game the player may, using a computer keyboard or mouse, exchange the positions of adjacent symbols in a horizontal row to obtain a set or sets of three or more like symbols in a horizontal row or a vertical column. When a set is created, the computer controls the game to issue the player an award of points based upon the symbol set(s), remove the matching set(s) from the display, shift the symbols above the removed set(s) downward into the positions of the removed symbols and reconstitute the matrix by selecting and displaying replacement symbols at the upper row of the matrix. The player continues with the game for so long as sets can be assembled by exchange the positions of horizontal adjacent symbols. By exchanging symbols the player can amass game points. The game progresses through certain scoring levels, with each successive scoring level becoming more difficult by the addition of another group of symbols to the symbol pool.
A drawback of this game is that it is not a casino-type wagering game and thus provides no mechanism by which a player may make a wager. In this regard the Bedazzled game is not configured to assign winning awards based upon player wagers to meet regulatory or commercial requirements.
There is a need to provide players with an ever increasing number of entertainment options in the form of new games.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a new game in the form of a game matrix where awards are based upon and issued for obtaining predetermined winning outcomes of symbol sets, arranged for example in adjacent same symbol sets such as horizontally, vertically, diagonally or in an L-shaped arrangement.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a game where winning outcome sets are removed from the matrix and are replaced to re-constitute the matrix and possibly define more winning outcome sets, still based upon the original wager.
It is another object to configure a game having the above objects which can meet gaming regulatory as well a commercial performance standards.
The present invention enables the casino to attract and retain players interested in playing an innovative slot game and the player enjoys a new method of receiving an award.